Adherents.com: Religious Groups in Literature

34,420 citations from literature (mostly science fiction and fantasy) referring to real churches, religious groups, tribes, etc. [This database is for literary research only. It is not intended as a source of information about religion.]

...'Forgive me... but that's one of the silliest ideas I've ever heard... I want to want to read all the great books, and all the trashy ones, too. I want to learn about Buddhism and Judaism and Seventh Day Adventists. I want to visit Australia and Japan...' "

"The point is obvious. There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches. Every minority, be it Baptist / Unitarian, Irish / Italian / Octogenarian / Zen Buddhist, Zionist / Seventh-day Adventist, Women'sLib / Republican, Mattachine / FourSquareGospel feels it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fire. "

"'The Lord was lookin' out for him.' The freckled sailor slipped a tiny gold chain from beneath his polo shirt, glancing at the attached cross like the White Rabbit consulting his pocket watch.

Neil winced. This wasn't the first time he'd encountered a Jesus aficionado. As a rule, he didn't mind them. Once at sea, they were usually diligent as hell, cleaning toilets and chipping rust without a whimper, but their agenda made him nervous. Often as not, the conversation got around to the precarious position of Neil's immortal soul. On the Stella, for example, a Seventh Day Adventist had somberly Neil that he could spare himself the 'trouble of Armageddon' by accepting Jesus then and there. "

Seventh-day Adventist

world

2003

Knight, Damon. The Observers. New York: Tor (1988); pg. 66.

"'...Going back a little, the Millerites said it was going to be in eighteen forty-three.'

'Why those particular dates?' asked anchor one.

'Well, God knows, if you'll pardon the expression. these movements... who studied the Bible for clues and think they have found...'

'Well, that's the interesting thing. Almost invariably it was the opposite of what you'd expect. The movement became more fervent, more cohesive and dedicated. They would advance the date, maybe for a year, or sex months, and then they'd advance it again, and typically it would be at least a year, more often eighteen months or two years, before the movement finally broke up. Sometimes it never did break up. Miller, for example, was the founder of the Seventh Day Adventist movement, and it's still going strong.'

'Now that's hard to believe,' said anchor two. 'Why would they react that way to a prophecy that didn't come true? I'd think it would be just the opposite.' "

"They went past another wall and into a room dominated by a giant erect phallus. 'The lingam of the Brahman God Siva, part of the Trinity of India,' Therion exclaimed with joyful recognition. 'Symbol and instrument of the creative faculty and the all-devouring fire, evolved into the rod, staff, scepter, and Crozier. Maybe we'll catch a glimpse of Siva's consort, the multi-armed Goddess Kali...' "

"...he had seen the scene of the box's reinterment so often, so often in his mind's eye, that he had invented the place. But not for nothing was he the descendant of spiritualists and Shakers. He gave weight to intuition. 'We'll start at the head,' he said, 'and excavate a decent depth, and progress towards the feet in an orderly way.' "

Shaker

galaxy

2733

Simmons, Dan. Hyperion. New York: Doubleday (1989); pg. 20.

"Martin Silenus... '...I have been a Catholic,... an interface zealot, a Bound Shaker, a satanist...' "

Richard F, one of the members of the "First Octave " who have been honored with "uncontaminated " Shaker surnames, explains this way: "We've got nothing against feebies. They have a piece of the Gift inside just like anyone else. But it's hard for them to travel with the Family. Jag-rock hurts their ears, and they can't sync with the Four Noes, no matter how hard they try. So we say to them, 'Forget it, star. Your wheels are not our wheels. But we're all going somewhere, right? See you at the other end.' "

It is hardly surprising that so many "feebies "--people over thirty--have trouble with the basic Believer's Creed: "No hate, No war, No money, No sex. " Evidently, in this final decade of the twentieth century, sainthood is only possible for the very young.

"They found the hillside overrun with people and carriages. A company of Shakers had arrived from Shrewsbury and was singing and whirling about like dervishes, and a congregation of Baptists had waded into the floodwaters. "

"The next day, Abiah testified at the Shrewsbury Meeting... Then she spoke in a more rambling way against the millenarians, against dancing and singing and the refusal to bring forth children. It wasn't until others spoke that Maggie realized that Abiah was referring to the Shakers, who were about to depart for America, under the leadership of an illiterate mill worker called Mother Ann Lee. "

"The 'Roundhouse' at Jerusalem West [in New York] is, in on sense, the Vatican of the nationwide movement. But in many ways it is typical of the New Shaker communities springing up from La Jolla, California to Seal Harbor, Maine. At last count there were sixty-one separate 'tribes,' some containing as many as fifteen 'families' of a hundred and twenty-eight members each. Each Shaker family is housed in an army-surplus pliodesic dome--covering some ten thousand square feet of bare but vinyl-hardened earth--which serves as bedroom, living room, workshop, and holy tabernacle, all in one. There is a much smaller satellite dome forty feet from the main building which might be called the Outhouse, but isn't--the New Shakers themselves refer to it as Sin City. In keeping with their general attitude toward the bodily functions, Sin City is the only place in the Jerusalem West compound that is off-limits to visitors. "

"As difficult as it may be for most North Americans to accept, today's typical Shaker recruit comes form a background of unquestioned abundance and respectability. There is no taint of the Ghetto and no evidence of serious behavioral problems. In fact, Preliminary School records show that these young people often excelled in polymorphous play and responded quite normally to the usual spectrum of chemical and electrical euphorics. As underteens, their proficiency in programmed dating was consistently rated 'superior'... Later, in Modular School, they scored in the fiftieth percentile or better on Brand-Differentiation tests... Yet for some reason, on the brink of maturity, they turned their backs on all the benefits their parents and grandparents fought so hard for in the Cultural Revolution--and plunged instead into a life of regimented sense-denial. "

"In my final year [of Law School] I became interested in the literature of religion--or, to be more precise, the literature of mysticism... Purely as an intellectual diversion I began to read St. John of the Cross, George Fox, the Vedas, Tao, Zen, the Kabbala, the Sufis. But when I came across the early Shakers I was struck at once with the daring and clarity of this purely American variant...:

"ENCLOSED: Fact sheet on Old Shakers...*1787-1794--Expansion of sect through New York State and New England.*1806-1826--Expansion of sect across Western frontier--Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana.*1837-1845--Mass outbreak of spiritualism. Blessings, songs, spirit-drawings and business advice transmitted by deceased leaders through living 'instruments.'*1850's--Highpoint of Society. Six thousand members, 18 communities, fifty-eight 'Families.'*Total recorded membership--from late 18th century to late 20th century--approximately seventeen thousand.*Old Shakes noted for--mail-order seed business, handicrafts (brooms, baskets and boxes), furniture-manufacture.*Credited with invention of--common clothespin, cut nails, circular saw, turbine waterwheel, steam-driven washing machine. "

"ENCLOSED: Fact sheet on Old Shakers...*Worship--Emphasis on communal singing and dancing. Early 'convulsive' phase gives way in 19th century to highly organized performances and processions--ring dances square order shuffles.*Beliefs--Celibacy, Duality of Deity (Father and Mother God), Equality of the Sexes, Equality in Labor, Equality in Property. Society to be perpetuated by 'admission of serious-minded persons and adoption of children.*Motto--'Hands to work and Hearts to God.' " [This entire story is about a future revival of the Shaker movement. It features extensive real information about Shaker history, practice and theology. Only a small amount of this story's extensive references to Shakers has been included in DB.]

"JERUSALEM WEST, N.Y., Thursday, June 28, 1995--The work of Salvation goes forward in this green and pleasant Hudson Valley hamlet to the high-pitched accompaniment of turbo-car exhausts and the amplified beat of the 'world's loudest jag-rock band.' Where worm-eaten apples fell untended in abandoned orchards less than a decade ago a new religious sect has burst into full bloom. In their fantastic four-year history the so-called New Shakers--or United Society of Believers (Revived), to give them their official title--have provoked the hottest controversy in Christendom since Martin Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the door of All Saints Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October Thirty-one, Fifteen-seventeen. Boasting a membership of more than a hundred thousand today, the New Shakers have been processing applications at the rate of nine hundred a week... the average New Shaker has not yet reached his 18th birthday. "

"Q. There's been a lot of controversy lately about whether your movement [New Shakers] is really Christian--in a religious sense. Would you care to comment on that?A. You mean like 'Jesus Christ, the Son of God'? Sure, we believe that. And we believe in Harry G, the Son of God and Richard F, the Son of God and--what's your name, star?--Raymond Senter, the son of God. That's the Gift. That's what it's all about. Jesus found the Gift inside. So did Buddha, Mother Ann, even Malcom X--we don't worry too much about who said what first. First you find the Gift--then you live it. The Freeway's plenty wide enough. "

"Q. What's your attitude toward the Old Shakers? They died out, didn't they, for lack of recruits?A. Everything is born and dies and gets reborn again.Q. Harry, what would happen if this time the whole world became Shakers?A. Don't worry, star. You won't be around to see it. "

"The range of hues seems endless but the intensity never varies, so that the entire spectacle presents a living demonstration of one of the basic Articles of Faith of the Shaker Revival--Diversity in Uniformity.

Now the procession has ended. The worshippers have formed two matching arcs, sixty-four boys on one side, sixty-four girls on the other, each standing precisely one arm's length from each neighbor. All are barefoot. All are wearing the same expression--a smile so modest as to be virtually undetectable if were not mirrored and remirrored a hundred and twenty-eight times around the circumference of the ritual circle. "

"Gerald Jonas... wrote a short story in 1970, 'The Shaker Revival,' which uncannily prefigures the Heaven's Gate phenomenon. Jonas imagines a cult of latter-day rock-'n-roll-inspired ascetics, who leave their homes and jobs, to affirm the four Noes: 'No hate, no war, no money, no death.' " [More, including a paragraph quoted from the story.]

"'As for snake dances, have you ever seen a Shaker service? Neither have I; a church that is agin [sic] sexual intercourse doesn't last. But dancing to the glory of God has a long history. It doesn't have to be artistic--the Shakers could never have made the Bolshoi--it merely has to be enthusiastic. Do you find Indian Rain Dances irreverent?' "

[Buddy Holley tells what happened after his plane crash in Africa.] "Bushmen found me. Tribesmen from out of the Kalahari. First thing I knew was a !Kung shaman leanin' down over me and lettin' out the most ungodly screams you ever heard. Later I found out he was taking the sickness into himself and then gettin' shed of it into the air... That was the beginning... I keep lookin'. I search everywhere. When I played a string of bars in the Dakotas and the Midwest I learned about Rolling Thunder and the generations of Black Elk. The more I learned, the more I wanted to know... When I was with the Lakota, I cried for a vision. The shaman took me through the inipi ceremony and sent me up the hill to receive the wakan, the holy beings.' Holley said ruefully. 'The Thunder Beings came, but that was about all. I got wet and cold.' He shrugged. 'So it goes.' "

"The aged shaman came down from a tundra village near the Noatak River in a very remote area of Alaska far above the Seward Peninsula, where the Athabaskan people still lived by subsistence and followed the ancient traditions.

...The men in Minnow, a tiny village on the shore of Norton Sound, heeded the shaman. They left their comfortable wooden houses and their color televisions and their satellite dishes and constructed a low structure out of sticks, walrus bone, and seal skins in the way of their forefathers. Then the men of the village stripped off their clothes and entered the qasgiq.

As per tradition, the shaman presided over the ritual ceremony. He stroked the fire built in the central pit, then banked it and tossed in some green branches to create smoke. " [More, pg. 114-117, 132-135, 166.]

Pg. 186: "I was thinking of Doors songs: 'Shaman's Blues,' 'The WASP,'... "; Pg. 187: "'That's what I aspire to. Shamanism's really the same, a few tricks to change your perspective. Get you back in touch with the world.'

'The Gaia thing.'

'Yeah. If you can make people experience the planet as a living thing, man, that's deep. You can turn them around.' " [More.]

"'...He didn't know who the Gorgons were. He named the valley after the formations, thinking, I suppose. He hasn't read any of the literature about shamanism, either, none of the Don Juan books, nothing like that...' "

[Year and place completely unknown, other than future, on another planet.] On book jacket: "...the healer Snake and her friend Arevin... Snake comes to Arevin's clan to heal a dying child. In her world, healers use the twined serpents as more than a symbol of their profession. The cobra and the rattler are essential to their work... During her quest she encounters the people of her future world: the gentle desert folk; the inhabitants of Mountainside, whose wealth and renowned beauty cannot free them from all ugliness; and the families of Center, who no longer care what happens in the world outside their city's gates. " [Although not mentioned specifically, the religious culture of the main character seems closely akin to Earth shamanism in many ways.]

"Many visions. He claimed to have been with the gods. Many others, over the years, had made the same claim. They were ministered to by the shaman, and sometimes they recovered from their madness and returned to live among the clan; but sometimes they did not. "

[Year estimated.] "'Of course not. We used to get along on Dovia just fine without cloned spare parts and the combined knowledge of the known worlds to fix every ache and pain. I don't even consult them any more. The shamans can tell me everything I need to know.'

He remembered when they first discovered Calla's genetic singularity; she hadn't had a tattoo then. Treatment for a broken hip, which should have resulted in a few days' stay in the clinic, left her near death. As the clinic became aware of her exceptional problems, they also realized how utterly incapable they were of dealing with them, and recommended euthansia [sic]. Instead, Jason had found a backworld shaman who agreed to treat her. That time she had recovered. And every time since then, he reminded himself, though he had not been there to aid her. Her durability was not surprising. With the possible exception of that one time, she never had needed him for anything. "

"The young Lacandon Maya... Lying in the shade, he began to blink and fall under his dream's spell once more. His dreams had taken him to the realm of the gods ever since he had been a boy, but it was rare that he remembered what the gods had said or done. Jose, the old shaman, became so angry when all he could recall were feelings or useless details from his latest vision. The only hope in it all was that the dream became more and more clear each time he had it. He had been denying to Jose that the dream had returned, waiting for the time when he could remember enough to impress even Jose, but the shaman knew he lied. "

"Inside the dark, smoke-filled thatch house Jose listened gravely to Hunapu's tale of his vision. The shaman nodded when Hunapu spoke of his audience with the gods. When he finished, he looked to the old man for interpretation and guidance.

'Your vision is a true one, Hunapu.' He straightened up and slide from his hammock to the dirt floor... 'You must do as the gods tell you or bring us all misfortune.'

'But where am I to go? What is Kaminaljuyu?' Hunapu shrugged in his confusion...

'Kaminaljuyu is Guatemala City. That is where you must go. But first we must prepare you.' The shaman looked past him. 'Sleep tonight. Tomorrow you will go.'

When he returned to the shaman's home in the morning, most of the village was there to share in the magical thing that had happened. When he left them, Jose walked with him into the rain forest, carrying a package. Out of sight of the village, the shaman wrapped Hunapu's elbows... " [Other refs., not in DB.]

Pg. 134: "'...I don't have any idea what you know about the Maya, but he's a chuchkajawib, an ajk'ij, umm, a priest-shaman type. Sometimes they're called the Daykeepers...' "; Pg. 136: "The shaman paused in the doorway, hieroglyphs dancing across his body. His eyes were closed and his right hand touched his left shoulder as if to confirm the message he felt internally. " [Other refs. not in DB.]

shamanism

Inuit planetoid

2100

Bell, M. Shayne. Inuit. Eugene, OR: Pulphouse (1991); pg. 4.

[Year estimated.] "...yet [Mother] made Father trade two good harpoons for the parka's white seal pelts. Father traded them without complain, even took the pelts to Unalakleet, the shaman, who pulled the mask from his face and touched the mask to the pelts. When the parka was sewn, Father sang his magic songs over it as if it were a kayak, harpoon, or lance, as if my sister were going on a whale hunt, not to school. " [Other refs. to Unalakleet the shaman in story, not in DB. No other refs. to word 'shaman. This entire story takes place within the traditional shamanistic culture of the Inuit people.]

shamanism

Maryland

1999

Bear, Greg. Darwin's Radio. New York: Del Rey (1999); pg. 236-237.

[Mitch is dreaming.] "At the top of a snow-covered rise, the man saw the shamans and their helpers following him and his woman. hey could not avoid leaving tracks in the snow, but even on the lower grasslands, through the forest, they had been tracked by experts... The woman plodded on. He knew he might escape if he abandoned her. The prospect made his anger darken. He hated the snow, the shamans, the mountains... The shamans and sisters of the Great Mother, of the Goat Mother, of the Grass Mother, the Snow Woman, Leopard the Loud Killer, Chancre the Soft Killer, Rain the Weeping Father, had all gathered and made their decision during the cooling times, taking painful weeks while the others--the others who had the marks--stayed in their huts. " [More, not in DB.]

Well, Echeverria's got this witch doctor down there, the Hinchi Indians, did you ever hear of the Hinchi Indians? They're an isolated tribe in central Mexico, near San Luis Potosi, who still practice the ancient Toltec rituals, sacred mushroom ceremonies, that sort of thing. Apparently, they use some kind of hallucinatory compound that's supposed to evoke a common experience for all users, interesting if true.' "

"An interesting account of a traditional system used by quite primitive Mexican Indians, yet basically similar to any and all of the above, is provided by anthropologist Carlos Castenada, who underwent training as a Yaqui shaman... "

shamanism

Mexico

1991

Ing, Dean. The Nemesis Mission. New York: Tor (1991); pg. 247.

"'...And from what my Mexican grandfather claimed, their [Maya] shamans have ways of knowing things, ways that have nothing to do with newspapers or TV news. Personally, I think that part has the reek of bullsh--. Satisfied now?' "

shamanism

Mexico

2028

Barnes, John. Mother of Storms. New York: Tor (1994); pg. 412.

"...There was a little bit of 'Chariots of the Gods' stuff, and for the Christers there was a lot of Quetzalcoatle-was-Jesus stuff, and for the New Agers there was crystals and shamanism...' "

shamanism

North America

-13211 B.C.E.

Anderson, Poul. The Shield of Time. New York: Tor (1990); pg. 178.

"The least of the houses, scarcely more than a hut, was Answerer's: for the shaman dwelt alone, save for whatever demons he kept at his beck. Often, though, a man or woman of the tribe sought to him... Magical objects seemed to stir in shadows. They were few, a drum, a whistle, engraved bones, dried herbs. Everyday possessions were meager too. His strength and life lay mainly in the spirit world. " [There is a lot of other material in the book about this ancient shamanistic nomadic culture.]

'Hickamore once mimicked a shaman freshly dead. His spells have succeeded beyond his maddest dreams. And I am Coyote...' ";

Pg. 373: "The shaman caught sight of Morth... 'Medicine woman's sarcasm? I feel the elemental's cold wet breath on my neck.' " [Other refs. not in DB. Much of the religious culture described in book is shamanistic.]

"One of her high school teachers... had proposed a theory he'd heard. He said that you were four contacts from everybody else in the world. For example: Chris might know a foreign exchange student from France, whose anthropology professor had done his doctorate in Papua New Guinea, where he had met a young boy whose shaman third cousin had discovered the plant that could kill the AIDS virus. "

"The alien stepped away from the closed elevator shaft with a bouncing gait. 'I am called Nikla, the shaman of my people. I sing to the memories of the stars. I listen to the breaths of our sleeping world. The Qu'utians dream of a new civilization, and someday our dreams will come true.'

...'This is what we have built since the Drej destroyed Qu'ut Prime.' A note of pride resonated in Nikla's voice.

Cale spluttered in astonishment. 'But that--that's only been decades. How could you do so much in--'

'We worked,' the shaman said. 'We worked hard...'

...The shaman led them to where a waterfall seeped through a crack in the strata high above... " [Many other refs. to this character, Nikla the shaman. The term 'shaman' mentioned also pg. 72-73, 80-823.]

As he looked up at the wall beside them, Cale noticed a symbol as large around as he was tall. It consisted of a circle made from some sort of cable or wire studded with stylized thorns; a strong, simple sword plunged through the center of the ring. He realized he had seen the symbol several times since coming underground: over doorways, on clothing, stenciled onto kites or balloons. Then, to Cale's surprise, he realized Nikla also had the same design tattooed on her shoulder, half-hidden by her tendrils of lichen-fur.

The shaman's mossy tendrils ruffled and fluttered. 'The symbol is very important to me. The outer circle represents a spikevine. In the past, the majority of Qu'utians were farmers...' " [May be other refs. relevant to Nikla's shamanism, not in DB.]

shamanism

Russia

1832

Bishop, Michael. Brittle Innings. New York: Bantam (1994); pg. 257.

[Character visits with a Siberian shaman, calling him a medicine man. Multiple pages on this subject.]

shamanism

Russia

2025

Stephenson, Neal. Snow Crash. New York: Bantam (1992); pg. 192.

"'...speaking in tongues?'...'glossolalia'... Pagan Greeks did it... The Tungus tribesmen of Siberia say that when the shaman goes into his trance and raves incoherent syllables, he leaves the entire language of Nature.' "

"Piruusi the Finn reveled in the snow... As he swept up to and past the tent of old Pehto, the shaman, Pehto came out and hailed him. Piruusi stopped, frowning. Pehto was too powerful with the spirits to vex, but he called always for attention, respect, food and fermented milk.

Not this time, Capering professionally and shaking his rattle, Pehto nevertheless for once spoke sense. 'To the west, Piruusi great hunter, lord of reindeer. To the west, something comes. Something with power, Piruusi, and a god's disfavor. Aiiee!' And he began a manic stamping dance, which Piruusi ignored... There was something there, sure enough. Had the old fraud really seen them with his mystic vision? Perhaps he had risen early to look, for they were plain enough, a straggle across the snow. First, men on skis... " [More.]

"'The Dugpas saw something they couldn't explain today,' continued Rachel. 'The speck of your ship against Chomo Lori, I mean. But eventually they explain everything in terms of tendrel, so it that won't be a problem.'

'What are tendrel?' I said. 'And who are the Dugpas?'

'Tendrel are signs,' said Rachel. 'Divinations within the shamanistic Buddhist tradition prevalent in this region of the Mountains of Heaven...' "

"'Speak to one of the Black Hat sect. There was once an old Black Hat ngagspa in the town. A sorcerer. Khorda, he was called. Practiced the old rites. Frightened the young monks with his spells. From a Nyingmapa gompa.'

The Black Hats comprised the most traditional of the Tibetan Buddhist sects, of which the Nyingmapa was the oldest line, the one most closely linked to the shamans who once ruled Tibet. "

shamanism

United Kingdom

1994

Holdstock, Robert. The Hollowing. New York: Roc (1994); pg. 42.

"Ghost-of-the-Tree, as the shaman was called, was badly broken. Fragments of bark hung from him like stiffened flaps of brown flesh. " [Also pg. 182]

'They look like Oriental monks, sir,' Barclay said. 'Not exactly Buddhist, but something like it. I remember seeing robes like that when I was out East in Nepal. Something to do with shamanistic rituals--'

'Tibetan black ngagspas.' Raeburn used the native term for 'sorcerers' with biting certainty... Leaving the drawer discreetly ajar, he was just drawing breath to give Barclay instructions when two exotic figures clad in orange and black stepped into the doorway. "

'That depends on the practitioner,' said Julian. 'I've read of some Buddhist sects whose adherents regard Phurbas [Tibetan ceremonial daggers] as votive objects. They accord them the same degree of veneration or even worship that Buddhists give to holy paintings and statues, and believe that such an object represents a physical locus for the saint or deity it depicts. On the other hand, there's a more primitive school of Phurba worshippers whose practices hark back to the shamanistic traditions that predate Buddhism. Students of this school view Phurbas as ceremonial objects to be used in the execution of certain magical rites.' "

'The Saxon called him Freya. I thought that was a Viking god or something.' ";

Pg. 213: "'Who was Sion?'

'A great Lord. A shaman. Lord of Power. He controlled the seasons so that Spring followed Summer, then Summer followed Spring. He could give men the power to fly like kestrels. His voice was so loud that it reached the heavens.' "

"Peter apes something that never was, a Scottish shaman. He wears a kaftan of tartan hung with metal ornaments and little mirrors and ribbons, and a tartan tan-o'-shanter abranch with deer horns. His kilt is hung with ritual things. He looks as though he has ridden out of a medieval Siberia in the heart of the Highlands. Shaman drums hang from his saddle; a dirk is stuck in his oatmeal stockings. Iconic and motley! "

"West shrugged. 'That's probably why the Navajo didn't put up too much of a struggle when Kit Carson came along to kick them out of Arizona. Most likely some shaman said, 'Okay, People, we've been kicked out of worlds before. We know what to do. We're on our way to someplace better.' ' West shrugged again. 'Even shamans get it wrong, sometimes, I guess.'

...Gordon considered this a while. 'I see,' he said at last, 'the classic end-of-time redemption and afterlife myth, as is common is so many primitive cultures. I expect the accompanying ceremonies and superstitions--'

West interrupted. 'Superstitions? Gordon, I tried to tell you before, I've seen a shaman heal a gunshot wound overnight! I've watched 'em make pebbles roll along the ground just by looking at 'em! I knew one shaman who could turn himself into a bird... "

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